Here's the thing. If one wanted, for the evulz, to harness all of the world's technological might to turning everything into something, then that something needs to be very powerful and useful, with the potential to work its way into everything. It needs to be something that big corporations, industry, particularly the military industrial complex, have a huge need for. It should be capable of finding its way into everyday appliances, our cars, and our homes. It should suffuse our entire lives, and even have the potential to shape, warp, and determine our most intimate relationships. It should be able to take over all culture through the media. It should be able to take over the whole of the economy, as if it's "eating" entire businesses. Whatever it is, watch out for something which starts to make exponential progress in its manufacture, speed, and efficiency. Watch for it to start to change and warp people's lives with exponentially increasing speed. But here's the kicker: make it go obsolete exponentially faster and faster, so it becomes trash faster and faster. It's not "pAIperclips." It's technology and computers. Ever have to deal with piles of e-waste? Our entire global civilization is being turned into e-waste maximizers.

For extra credit, the evul technophagic overlords should also addict the meat-things to something which is super lucrative and useful but will slowly destroy their environment -- so slowly, they will deny it to themselves.

StCredZero wrote:Here's the thing. If one wanted, for the evulz, to harness all of the world's technological might to turning everything into something, then that something needs to be very powerful and useful, with the potential to work its way into everything. It needs to be something that big corporations, industry, particularly the military industrial complex, have a huge need for. It should be capable of finding its way into everyday appliances, our cars, and our homes. It should suffuse our entire lives, and even have the potential to shape, warp, and determine our most intimate relationships. It should be able to take over all culture through the media. It should be able to take over the whole of the economy, as if it's "eating" entire businesses. Whatever it is, watch out for something which starts to make exponential progress in its manufacture, speed, and efficiency. Watch for it to start to change and warp people's lives with exponentially increasing speed. But here's the kicker: make it go obsolete exponentially faster and faster, so it becomes trash faster and faster. It's not "pAIperclips." It's technology and computers. Ever have to deal with piles of e-waste? Our entire global civilization is being turned into e-waste maximizers.

For extra credit, the evul technophagic overlords should also addict the meat-things to something which is super lucrative and useful but will slowly destroy their environment -- so slowly, they will deny it to themselves.

well, the paperclip optimizer just chose to stretch the definition of "paperclip" a bit